


a bell that seems to mourn the dying light

by OrsFri



Category: Captive Prince - C. S. Pacat
Genre: Alternate Universe - Modern Setting, In Which Reality is a Farce and Nothing Happens, M/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-04-03
Updated: 2018-04-03
Packaged: 2019-04-17 17:55:55
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 10,105
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/14194497
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/OrsFri/pseuds/OrsFri
Summary: The days pass in fragments, Damen loves in pieces, and Laurent learns a lesson in reality.Modern AU (of sorts)





	a bell that seems to mourn the dying light

**Author's Note:**

> My first fic for the cp fandom is intended to be maximally 5000 words long, but it grew into a 10,000+ words monster in which nothing happens. This is also potentially but intentionally confusing so if you get lost and don’t want to puzzle it out, jump to the notes at the end.

Chimes that reminds him of the sound of sirens, and he closes his eyes.

* * *

In the last room of the third floor, he tells Laurent, sleeps the only person in the world that he loves.

"Unfortunately," Damen explains, "they are very sick. So please do not disturb them."

Laurent frowns. But he doesn't press, and that means something, Damen thinks.

He directs Laurent to the second floor because no one likes the ground floor. "The last room lets in the best light," he suggests, and Laurent accepts it, because there is no reason to disagree. It is also on the opposite end of his love's room. but Laurent doesn't have to know that.

While his love's room faces down towards the road so that they can see the dipping of the sun below the canopy, Laurent's room faces the sea, which always seems to glow in gentle hues in the early morning when the sun casts its first rays and the waters glitter. Laurent pushes open the window, blinking in surprise at the sudden gust of wind.

"I hope," Damen continues, "that you will have a good stay."

"Sure," says Laurent, and drops his duffel against the wall. He stares expectantly at Damen.

Damen excuses himself.

* * *

Nikandros has said that Laurent is a brilliant academic seeking some peace and quiet to work on his research. Nikandros has also said that Laurent is the younger brother of a charismatic friend of a good friend, and both information gives Damen the impression that Laurent will be the kind to lock himself in a room for days on end.

This thought gives Damen pause; he kisses the brow of his love, taking the half-finished bowl from frail fingers, and leaves to knock on Laurent's door.

"Morning," he greets brightly at the sight of Laurent. "I made some breakfast."

He passes Laurent the extra plate of bread and its assortments. Laurent accepts, before gesturing at the bowl. "That is?"

Damen thinks about telling Laurent the truth. Thinks about revealing how much less his love eats everyday. He says, "My protein shake."

Laurent arches both eyebrows, and Damen can't even feel offended because who eats an entire _bowl_ of protein shake? But Laurent's eye falls on Damen's shoulders, the bulge of the muscles against his shirt at his biceps, and Laurent's eyes dart back to Damen's face. "I see," he says placidly.

Damen raises the bowl in a mock toast. "Have a good meal. Just leave the plate in the kitchen sink after you're done."

* * *

Later, Damen finds the plate washed and stacked neatly on the rack.

It's a strange feeling, having someone else in the house.

* * *

He brings Laurent around the area on the second day. The mansion is at the end of this road too long and too remote to be called a cul-de-sac. The road ends in front of a footpath in the middle of the woods, and at the end of the path is Damen's family mansion, a tall, simple thing with marble pillars and faded blue-grey rooftops perched atop a cliff.

"There's the lighthouse," he points out, "I light it on stormy nights."

He walks Laurent down through the woods, branching away from the main footpath to show him the clearing filled with blood-red poppy, the old pine tree that is rumoured to be a thousand years old, the mysterious waterfall that seems to flow to nowhere for all eternity.

Ultimately, they reach the end of the road. Damen _can_ walk Laurent to town, but it's been _ages_ since he last went there and he can't very much remember how long it takes to traverse the road, only that it used to take an hour by car. When Damen looks back, he can see the spires of his mansion. Laurent stares up at it, face stoic. Damen wonders what he is seeing.

"This is as far as I can walk you," Damen says after a beat too long. "I don't want to leave my love alone for too long. Let's go back: I'll slice up some apples. The fruits on the apple trees are just about ripe; we can see if my efforts paid off."

Laurent looks at him. "Do you ever feel lonely?" he asks.

Damen smiles indulgently. "Why will I feel lonely?" he replies. "I will be spending the rest of my days with my love. I'm too happy to be lonely."

Laurent doesn't look like he understands, but that is ok; Damen's never expected him to.

* * *

_Here is a memory: Damen falls a little in love._

_Kastor has once scorned the easy affection that Damen throws around. Calls him cheap, calls his dates easy. Damen will feel hurt, except his father sees Damen's relationships as a mark of conquest, and his pride smooths over Kastor's hurt._

_But his love, they are different. His love is something uniquely his, separate from the judgement of all but himself._

_He calls his love Sweetheart, and falls a little bit deeper in love._

* * *

Damen wipes the sweat off his love's face. His love smiles, lips stretching tightly against paper-thin skin. Damen traces the edges of their eyes and wonders, if he presses just hard enough, he will feel the veins thrumming against his fingers.

His love hardly speaks anymore, so Damen presses a kiss at the corner of their lips and assures them that he will only be downstairs, _ring the bell if you need me, alright?_ and slips down the stairs.

Two weeks into his stay, and Laurent is finally relaxed enough to lounge elsewhere apart from his room. He is still quiet, however; reserved, and conversation is sparse. Damen nods at him; he nods back. Damen heads to the study so that he can call Nikandros.

These days, Damen keeps all his connections to the rest of the world in this single study. A single landline, affixed to his desk, is all he needs now.

"Nik," he says into the phone, "will you help me deliver some groceries? I'm running out, and I don't like leaving my love alone for long."

Nikandros sounds put out, but agrees eventually, because he always does. That, and because Damen is doing Nikandros a favour by letting Laurent stay. Damen is pretty sure that Laurent's purpose is less to enjoy a rest rather than to fly under the radar, but then again, it is none of Damen's business. Damen's business is to take care of his love and the mansion, and that's all that matters.

He hangs up and grabs one of the books that he has read so many times that he almost had it memorised, and heads back towards the living room. Laurent sits with his legs crossed on the couch, a pen in hand as he scribbles into a book.

"Here's something I thought you might like," Damen says, handing the book over. "Also, I forgot to mention since you didn't ask, but: if you need to make any calls, there is a study. It's two doors to the left of the basement."

"It's fine," says Laurent, "I came here to be disconnected from my usual circles."

"I know, but there is a landline there, if you need it," Damen says, "it's a bit out of the way, but. Excessive radiation is bad for my love’s health. I don’t want to risk it.”

Laurent's nod seems to mean something like _no worries,_ and _I understand,_ so Damen leaves him to it and heads out to the lawn where the apple trees grow. It's almost routine to sweep the fallen leaves and twigs and check the fruits for worms, even before Laurent has arrived; there is no reason for Damen's habits to change, now.

There is an apricot tree that Damen has planted from seed. It is grown now, green and thick, and Damen prunes it dutifully every winter. But the tree has never fruited; it flowers, but the flowers wither, and the fruits never arrive. Damen misses the taste of apricot. He has not tasted apricots ever since the one fruit that has sprouted into this apricot tree on the lawn.

He revels in the feeling of the sun against his skin as he squats by the shrubs. Weeds are pulled, sweat is trickling down the side of his face, his fingers are caked satisfyingly in mud when Laurent says, "Oh."

Damen glances back. "Hello."

"I'm heading to town," says Laurent, "to send some emails. Are you coming along?"

"That will be fine," says Damen, and resumes his gardening.

When Laurent returns, the sky looks downcast: the sun hangs low against a whitewashed backdrop, and storm clouds loom, the wet air suffocating and cool.

During Laurent's absence, Nikandros has delivered the groceries and the lighthouse has been lit. Damen stands in the doorway and waves Laurent over.

"If you're any slower," Damen tells him, as the first drops fall, "you'd be caught in the rain, and it's hard to find your way when it rains."

Laurent hides it well, but there is queasiness tainting the edges of his mouth as he steps into the house. Damen thinks that whatever that has Laurent heading to town must not be good. He rolls back his shoulder and smiles. "I brewed some beef stew. I've been told it's deliciously hearty."

Laurent studies Damen for so long that it's bordering on uncomfortable.

"Thank you," he finally says, slowly.

* * *

The rain beats on the windows like the sound of drums, and Laurent wanders the halls, staring at the photographs hung on the walls beside the stairs. He points at one of them. "Who is that?"

"Oh, her?" Damen smiles. "That's my childhood sweetheart. Her name is Lykaios."

Laurent nods absently. "Then him?"

"A buddy from college." They met through the short-lived wrestling club. "We dated briefly."

Laurent proceeds to point out Nikandros and Torveld and precious Erasmus. Damen's smile wobbles when Laurent points at Jokaste.

"She's the one that got away," he says, and Laurent averts his eyes.

Damen shows him his family. There is a picture of his parents, one where his father and the mother whom he can't remember are standing stoically together in their wedding shoot. There is another shot during the after-party, wherein Makedon has an arm thrown around both of them, grinning in that goofy way of his that reveals drunkenness. Then there's another with his father and his mistress, Kastor and Damen sitting at their feet, him beaming and Kastor sullen.

(Kastor, who left the house after a rebellious streak and a violent argument that ends with their father tumbling down the stairs. Kastor, with the opaque emptiness in his eyes that shields all thoughts after the doctor tells them that _sorry, we can't do anything,_ while the slow realisation that Kastor has _killed_ their father dawns.

(The biggest twist, in the end, is that neither Damen, the supposed heir, nor Kastor, who rages so furiously against his presumed glass ceiling, inherited their father's greatest assets. In their father's will, Damen gets an old mansion and Kastor gets the childhood home he later sold, and Hypermenestra inherits the rest, multinational company and all.))

There is no point in telling Laurent that; Damen directs his attention to his ancestors instead, dry facts and ghost stories that his father used to tell guests just to fill up the silence until they can move on to real talk. In turn, Laurent tells him about his brother and his mother and the little boy next door called Nicaise who he's taken a liking to.

This is the most conversation that they've had since Laurent moved in. Damen rather likes it, he thinks.

* * *

The rain doesn't stop for a week.

The inevitable ennui settles in their joints and sinks deep into their marrow; Laurent is obviously bored, and he spends most of his time in the study. Even then, books can only capture his attention for so long - especially since it turns out that Laurent has already read most of the books that Damen owns. By the fourth day, Laurent is lying on the couch, staring up listlessly at the ceiling, occasionally reaching for his notebook to pen down his thoughts.

"Damen," Laurent calls. Damen stops in his track, a bowl of fish porridge in hand. "I know a doctor. He's looked after my family for ages - Doctor Paschal. I could refer you to him."

What Laurent doesn't say, but Damen knows, is _why are you shutting them up if they are truly that sick? Why do I never see them? Why do I never_ hear _them? Where are the bottles of medicine and pills and house-visits from medical practitioners?_ It doesn't add up; Damen knows that.

"My love's condition is different," Damen explains. He leaves it at that.

Laurent doesn't ask again.

* * *

They find himself spending too much time in each other's company until Damen has memorised the lines of Laurent's back, the sound of his gait his breathing, the flex of Laurent's wrists when he moves.

Extended company brews frustration brews familiarity that cumulates into domesticity, and naturally, Laurent also spends too much time involuntarily watching Damen. "You look like a playmate from my childhood," Laurent suddenly says, a strange realisation dawning upon his face.

"Me? How so?"

"I don't know," Laurent admits, "I can't pinpoint the details. But I've always thought you looked familiar. Now I know why: you're a piece of my memory."

"But I'm not your childhood friend," Damen promises, "I will remember someone like you."

Laurent stares.

"I will remember your hair," Damen amends. "It's beautiful. It makes an impression."

Laurent looks like he is momentarily caught afoot. He quickly recovers. "You remind me of him."

"I can't be him," Damen insists. "Think harder: I'm not him."

Laurent blinks hard like he's confused by his own head. Damen can relate; patchwork memories, these days, and everything in between can be made-up to fill the gaps. "I know you're not him," he snaps, face stoic but the lines of his jaw tensed, "he's dead. But I thought you might be related."

Damen smiles sadly, turning up both palms. "As I said, I would have remembered you."

* * *

His love's cheekbones are so sharp that they cut through their skin.

Damen wipes the beads of blood away with a thumb. Sucks on his thumb like a child.

"My love," he says, cradling their hands - so frail, so weak, fluttering like butterflies when they move - and bringing them to his lips. "Sweetheart, my love."

* * *

The next day, the rain stopped.

* * *

_A scene, from the future: Laurent has once asked him why the top floor? It is too reminiscent of the mad women in the attics, the ghosts of forgotten rooms._

_"I heard that the air at higher places is better," Damen reasons._

_"Yes," says Laurent, "but it's also thinner," and Damen frowns. He doesn't know what Laurent sees when looking at him, but Laurent's eyes widen just that slightly and his jaws clench._

_"But it's too late now," says Damen, "they are too weak to be moved."_

* * *

Laurent, for all his quiet and all his coolness, is getting curious, Damen can tell.

He tries to deter Laurent by pointing out new attractions in the woods and bringing Laurent up the lighthouse. Laurent has stared up the lighthouse's stairs in muted wonder, amazed by the physical impossibility of its structure while comparing it to the replica lithograph of Escher's Relativity that Damen has hung by the door, and is only shaken out of his reverie when Damen starts climbing the steps.

Having Escher's stairs on a three-dimensional landscape is, ultimately, an optical illusion, and they quickly reach the top. Damen ended up teaching Laurent to read the stars while they share a bottle of vintage in the lighthouse. Laurent does not drink, but is not unamenable to making exceptions on lazy nights as such.

Nonetheless, there is something amusing about watching a grown man nursing a single glass throughout the night. And Damen served him _dessert wine._ In a _teacup_. Will wonders ever cease.

"That's Cassiopeia," he points out. Then, tapping his mouth, he continues, "A lesson in loose lips."

Laurent's eyes flick down before being drawn back towards the stars. "Nonetheless, some things are better said than kept silent."

His eyes are distant, inwards, as though looking at miles and miles of memories within. This is veering into personal territory for Laurent; Damen changes the topic. "Let's play twenty questions," he says, "favourite fruit?"

"Apricots," says Laurent without pause.

"I have an apricot tree about to blossom," Damen exclaims, "if it fruits, I will offer my first fruit to you."

"If?"

"Oh, the tree is temperamental," Damen admits, "it refuses to fruit. I have been patient, but I am starting to think it may be ornamental."

Laurent nods absently. "My turn." He cocks his head. "Happiest memory?"

The simplicity of the question startles a chuckle out of Damen. Trust Laurent to be able to come up with a question that is deeply personal yet does not feel too invasive. "I would say, that is the first time I realise that my love truly loves me back."

"Everything about you seems to revolve around your lover."

"My love," Damen corrects gently. "They are not just a lover: they are all my love."

"Your love," Laurent amends. "You love them a lot."

Damen lets his eyes drift. "I do." The stars sparkle brightly. It almost looks like they are smiling. If stars have a sound, Damen will say that they tinkle. "Now it's my turn again: deepest love?"

Laurent hesitates. He pushes himself up off his elbows, adjusting until he is cross-legged and facing Damen. "Unlike you, I'm not a romantic sap. I love my brother the most. He's great."

"I'm not asking who you love the most; I'm asking who you love the deepest."

"Is there a difference?"

Damen laughs, deep and light. In the moonlight, Laurent's eyes glitter like stars. "Of course there is. Think about it. A mother's love is the _greatest_ , but you can only fall _deeply_ in love. They are different kinds of love."

Laurent glances up and leans back on his palms. "I'm not sure I have ever felt such deep love for someone," he says, "or I do, but I'm not sure..." He hesitates. Takes a sip that becomes a gulp. "But it came close."

Damen lets the quiet stews, lets the incomplete answer prompts itself for more. The night whispers gently, coaxing, the way the darkest nights do when the hours run long and his vision made only possible by the glow of streetlights and neon signs, dark nights to say the things that you can't say tomorrow day. Laurent lowers his lashes. "I don't even remember his face anymore - I can't even remember his _name._ But he is quite something. Something... different. I thought, I-” A quiet, sharp inhale filled with too much hurt. “I don't know what to think," Laurent confesses. "I think I might love him."

Damen thinks of his love in the room, his love on the bed, a butterfly resting on the white walls of the sheets. "You should tell him."

"Too late: he's gone."

"Then look for him," Damen insists. "Talk to him. You obviously miss him, and who knows? Maybe he misses you too. You should tell him - when you leave eventually, I mean." Laurent doesn't react. "Speaking of which - how long are you staying for?"

"Why, do you want me gone?" And with that, the atmosphere has transformed: Damen protests the question.

Laurent smiles wryly, and this - _this_ hits Damen with an overwhelming sense of dysphoria, a familiarity on a different face that disorients and raises so many unbidden questions that Damen is momentarily overwhelmed. He blinks, and his mind settles. "Not so soon. I will be staying until Auguste gives me the green light."

Auguste - his brother, Damen recalls aloud. Laurent nods. "He watches out for me."

"It's always good to have someone watching out for you," says Damen, and he means it.

* * *

One morning, Laurent walks down the stairs with his duvet around his shoulders.

He takes one look at Damen and sniffles.

"Slept well?" Damen asks redundantly. Laurent glares at him.

Damen scrapes his plan for pancakes and makes two bowls of chicken soup instead.

* * *

"Damen," Laurent says, later, after finishing Damen's soup so fast that Damen worries that perhaps Damen hasn't been feeding Laurent right for the past few weeks. "There is no one else who lives in this mansion? Or perhaps visit?"

"No?" He runs the water over the sponge. Watches the soap suds form as he rubs off the oil. "It's always been only my love and me. Sometimes Nikandros - that's my best mate - he'll visit, and that's about it."

"No one else?" Laurent presses. "Perhaps it's the kids from town deciding to explore the woods?"

"No," Damen finishes firmly. "No curious kids, no lost joggers, no adventurous hikers. Any visitors will have to climb up the road to the front of the mansion; you'll see them coming." He pauses. "Why do you ask?"

"Nothing," Laurent says. Then he adds, "I thought I saw shadows on the lawn."

Damen's brows scrunch together. "When was this?"

"Last night." Laurent frowns. "The moon was bright last night. I didn't think it was a trick of the eye."

"I'll go investigate," Damen promises.

"Thank you," says Laurent. Damen shrugs. He doesn't plan to make good on the promise.

* * *

Laurent eventually recovers, and they go collecting poppies because Damen wants to make poppy seed cake. "My love hardly makes any request," Damen explains, "so when they do ask, I do my best to grant their desires."

The field of red poppies stretch as far as the eye can see; Laurent shifts uncomfortably.

"What's wrong?" Damen asks.

"I don't like the colour red," Laurent answers simply. “It’s nothing.”

They wander deeper into the valley, careful not to crush the flowers. Damen looks for the seed pods - as ripe as he can find - and snips them off with two sharp cuts.

"Did you know," he tells Laurent, "if I make a small cut right here while the pods are still green and then leave the sap to dry - did you know that if I do that and then collect it to be processed, I can make opium and even heroin?"

"Should I be concerned?" Laurent stares at the pods in distaste. "I am not a fan of anything that lowers my inhibitions or slows me down."

"The opiate content in poppy seeds are too low to cause hallucinations."

"I know," Laurent says, "I mean that you know how to make narcotics."

Damen snorts. "Everyone in this town knows how to make drugs," he explains. "This town used to produce opium back when the trade is booming," he continues, "especially during the war. Morphine is in high demand, both at the frontlines and back in the cities. When the world is going to hell, it's easier to pass the days in a delusionary paradise."

"That is foolish escapism; spending your days in a haze won't make the war end faster."

"Doesn't it," Damen agrees, "but even after the war, morphine addiction is a common side-effect."

"I don't understand war," Laurent suddenly says. "All those cruelty. I don't understand how anyone can let it happen."

"There are many reasons. Honour, for one. For another, power."

"But at the cost of so many lives," Laurent argues, disturbingly calm, "how can the end justify the means?”

“Maybe there isn’t. But there’s not always alternatives when diplomacy breaks down.”

"I'm not necessarily talking about international war. There are gang wars, wars against women, trade wars, hereditary wars - is war inevitable?" His voice rises, upset creeping in that hints at something personal, and for a moment, Laurent looks like a lost child, distressed by the callousness he finds awaiting him in future. "Why do we live in a world where I am forced to be cruel?"

"Look at you," says Damen, "drunk on opiate pollen."

"What?"

"I'm joking: you can't get drunk on pollen."

Laurent blinks, looking visibly confused by his lapse of composure. It's a pity, but Laurent doesn't understand (not yet) the rules of the world, the nature of silence, how loneliness and frustration can draw out words so candid that Damen knows are never meant to be spoken.

Damen laughs, not unkindly. "You're a sweetheart, aren't you?" Damen crouches down and snips off the biggest bloom, if only because the flower is about to wither. He tucks it behind Laurent's left ear. "Here, a flower for you," he says, "as sweet as your heart and the reddest of them all. If you wear the queen of reds, no other reds can threaten you."

"That doesn't make any sense," Laurent protests, but his lips are twitching.

(And Laurent is beautiful, then. Beautiful and radiant, the sun's rays bouncing off his hair like a halo, his pale skin glowing like the quiet happiness on his face.

Damen's breath catches, for just a moment, before he remembers to breathe.)

Laurent helps pick out the ripe seed pods until the edges of the sky start to turn grey. Then, they make their slow trek back home, back through the woods into a mansion white and solid.

* * *

His love looks at him with an emotion that he sees in Laurent.

Damen blinks, and the familiarity is gone, the brightness in his eyes has lost its shine, and it looks so clear, so transparent, that it sends shivers down Damen's spine.

"Do you like the pie?" he asks instead, because he's learnt that it's better to trust his memories than his sight these days.

His love smiles, a wry thing wherein only the edges of his mouth crooks up. Damen blinks again. "It's as good as it ever is."

"I'm glad." He leans in. “You’re getting better.” Touches his nose to theirs. "Goodnight, my love."

* * *

Nikandros' response can be summarised as an _oh, Damen, no,_ but Damen isn't deterred.

 _"_ At least tell me his favourite colour," Damen pleads, "ask his brother - the friend of a friend."

Damen does not need to see to know that Nikandros is rolling his eyes over the phone. Nonetheless, Nikandros promises to ask.

 _"_ I will miss him when he leaves," Damen admits. "Did you know? He has the same smile as my love."

Nikandros calls him a lovesick fool. Damen rather thinks that's extraneous information.

* * *

"What are you doing?"

Damen turns away from the window. "Couldn't sleep?"

"Somewhat." Hesitation. "I feel like I've been sleeping for a long time. This place feels like a dream."

"Doesn't it," says Damen. "Look there: two ships passing in the night."

"Momentary," Laurent allows.

"Transient," Damen challenges.

"Ephemeral."

"Ephemeral," Damen concurs, thinking of mist, of morning dew, of the translucent skin that stretches over the blue-purple veins on his love's wrist. "That's what makes a moment precious."

"Yes," Laurent agrees, eyes wandering off towards the horizon, mind lost in old memories and unknown thoughts. "Yes, it does."

* * *

_A scene that will never be retold:_

_An eternity is but a moment, says Damen, and kisses Laurent on both his lids. Goodnight._

* * *

Laurent wants to go to town.

Damen frowns, and he says, you may want to reconsider that.

Maybe it's his tone and maybe it's his wording, but Laurent's face shutters. "Are you doubting my ability to make my own decisions?"

"What? No. What makes you think that?" What's gotten into you, Damen wants to say but doesn't, because he's not stupid. He lowers his book - an old one that Egeria apparently loves. Damen has never finished it. "It's late. Trying to navigate the woods at night will get you lost."

Laurent raises both eyebrows. "You can't get lost on a straight road."

"That's what you think," says Damen, "but the moon has a way of leading you in circles."

"I was driven here from town during the early hours of dawn and I managed just fine."

"But that's dawn. At dawn, you know sunrise is coming. You don't know what you will find in the dark," Damen cautions. "Go tomorrow morning." A pause. "Who drove you here, anyway?"

It can't be a loved one, or they would have walked Laurent to Damen's door. Laurent seems momentarily stunned, as though discovering a missing piece in his memory. "There's a man," he answers slowly.

"A man?"

"A man from town," Laurent elaborates. "He claims to be giving hitch-hiking services to tourists and locals around town." At Damen's sceptical frown, he clarifies, "His credibility was backed by many. I checked during the first few days I arrived."

"He sounds familiar. What does he look like?"

"He," Laurent tries hard to recall, "he has a long beard and narrow shoulders. Looks like a paintbrush. Wears a russet hoodie. Has a black parka thrown messily on the backseats. I thought it was a bunch of trash bags."

"I think I know who you're talking about," Damen begins slowly. "I didn't know his service extends to visitors now."

"Maybe you'll know if you head out of the house more often," Laurent comments, his face smooth and voice flat, and Damen genuinely can't tell if it's advice, observation, or a taunt.

Damen thinks about being snarky, but Laurent turns around to head back up the stairs, the slight drag in his feet revealing the fatigue mixed with his restlessness, and Damen still has enough heart in him to not go around making situations deliberately worse.

* * *

The next day there is another storm, this time more vicious than the other: the sky cracks open, purple and dark, the seas roaring and the winds screaming. The flashes are fast and loud - the sound of bullets - and Damen guesses from the volume that there must be young trees that are struck down, old trees split right down the middle.

Damen braves the storm to light the lighthouse and ends up spending a full hour just standing under the chill of the rain's assault every day, watching the horizon. There is something soothing about watching a storm on the top of the cliff and feeling so close to the raw power of nature, but Laurent is visibly unnerved.

"Not a fan of storms?" Damen teases, as Laurent huddles near the fireplace.

"No." Laurent flips the pages of the book viciously. Damen is about to look away when his brain finally catches up with his eyes and he registers the title.

"Huh. That book's the one I passed you during your first week."

Laurent's fingers still. "Yes?"

"I thought you've read it before?"

Laurent shrugs: a fluid movement, and pulls the book closer to his face. "I want to reread it."

"I thought you'll like it." Damen grins. "I was right, wasn't I?"

"Don't be smug," Laurent warns coolly even though the corners of his lips are curved upwards and looking caught between mirth and annoyance. "It's a lucky guess."

"Of course."

* * *

"He likes the book," Damen tells his love. "Almost as much as you do." Then, hesitantly, "I hope you don't mind that I loan out your book."

His love smiles. "Ask me if I'm happy."

Damen tucks a flyaway strand behind his ear. The hair is brittle under his touch. "Are you happy?"

"Of course I am," his love answers, quotes. "I am the mistress of all I survey -- the queen of my own domain."

"Wouldn't you rather be the Empress?"

"No: that would be a lot of bother. I don't care for society, or pomp, or posing. All I ask is to be left alone with my love and not to be annoyed by intruders."

His love reaches out, brittle hands cupping Damen's cheeks. "This Tin Man is going to marry a nice girl through kindness, and not because he loves her, and somehow that doesn't seem quite right."

"Sweetheart," Damen says, because he still loves his love, this brittle sweetheart, loves them as much as the day they first fell in love, love them as much as the sea is deep and to the moon and back, and Damen aches, and aches, and aches.

* * *

"Damen," Laurent says one day, "I tried using the phone, but the line is cut."

There are dark eyebags under Laurent's eyes. His movements are slower, as though so tired that he's about to topple off his own feet. He looks like he hasn't slept for days.

"Must be the storm," Damen says. As if on cue, the lightning flashes outside. "I can't do anything until the storm stops."

"Will it ever stop?" Laurent presses. "It's been raining for almost a month." He hesitates. "This isn't normal."

"It's normal here."

"No, this is not normal _anywhere,_ " Laurent points out. "How has the soil not corroded?"

"The geography is unique."

Laurent glares furiously at the landscape, as though he can _will_ the skies to clear through the sheer strength of his frustration alone. "I shouldn't have let you stop me the other time. I'm heading to town."

"The roads are too slippery for trekking."

"Then I'll call for a driver."

"The landline is cut," Damen reminds, "and anyway, it is too risky to drive. It's impossible to wait for one, too, because no one else comes here unless it is to the specific purpose of coming to this house."

"I'll walk slowly." Laurent insists. "I'd rather brave the rain than rot here."

"Calm down, Laurent. Your frustration is preventing you from being reasonable."

"I feel like I'm developing cabin fever," says Laurent. "Did you know? Last night, I thought I saw a white creature prowling through the corridors, but when I tried to follow it, it disappeared into the third floor, into _your_ room. I thought I must be dreaming, or maybe your love was visiting your room, but then you came out of your love's room and I-"

"Laurent," says Damen, "you are talking so fast that you're not making any sense."

"I feel like I'm going crazy here, Damen," Laurent snaps, "when will this rain stop?"

"I don't know," Damen answers honestly.

* * *

Laurent shuts himself up in his room, after, because he needs to think and Damen is being a distraction.

Damen lets him stew for a day. Two, and the situation has become too foolish to not put an end to it. Damen brews three mugs of hot chocolate, and after tending to his love, knocks on Laurent's door.

Laurent doesn't answer, but he may as well have thrown a cushion at the door and yell, "Go away," like an angsty teenager.

"Are you still alive in there?" Damen asks. "Or will I find mushrooms growing on you when I break open the door?"

Laurent walks too softly for footsteps, so it is something of a surprise when the door swings open in the subsequent two seconds. "With the way it's storming outside, you won't need a corpse for mushrooms to grow," Laurent answers. He is wearing glasses. His eyes fall on the mugs.

"I added marshmallows," Damen supplies encouragingly.

Laurent grabs the mug and steps back. "Come in if you'd like." He doesn't quite _shuffle,_ but there is an awkwardness to his movement, as though he is showing something greatly personal about himself and is feeling particularly exposed. Which is stupid, because this room is Damen's first, and even if he's starting to think of it as _Laurent's room_ in his head, Laurent is only a guest, ready to move out the moment Auguste gives him the green light.

Laurent sits on his bed, wherein half-opened books and papers with messy scribblings are sprawled all around: _Siddhartha_ contemplates the _Interpretation of Dreams, The Great Divorce_ a symptom of Madness _and Civilization,_ and _The Fictional Christopher Nolan_ hovers like an outsider amidst chaos.

"Interesting," says Damen, settling on the desk chair. "Niks told me that you are an academic?"

Laurent nods. "I'm writing a paper on social behaviours."

"Vague."

"At this point," Laurent confesses, "I'm not sure what exactly I'm writing."

Damen tugs one of the papers from the pile. _Late Renaissance Conceptualisations of the Dreamscape,_ says title 4.2.2. "What did you intend to write?"

"Social commentary in the form of our subconscious," answers Laurent, taking the paper back. "Dreams as a representation of escapism. Unreality as a manifestation of reality. Some unholy combination of the three."

Damen laughs, leaning back and letting his body loosen. "This all sound highly metaphysical," he says, "which makes your vagueness appropriate."

"It's not _supposed_ to be vague." Laurent looks like he is trying to glare his papers into submission. "How I will transform all these _vagueness_ into something thematically consistent enough to be considered _abstract_ is the question."

Damen snatches the paper away from Laurent again, this time making sure to grab the ballpoint on the sheets. Fortunately, Laurent has capped it. "Let me help: see here," he comments, edging forward so that Laurent can peer over. "This one's phrasing is awkward. It doesn't flow well with the rest of the paragraph, much less the page. Either take it out, or push it to another part. Maybe something on religious symbols."

"I have a part on that." Laurent flusters about, finding and sorting and stacking papers until he finds the one he needs. "If I insert it here -"

"That can work," Damen finishes. "See, this is more cohesive now." He hands over the pen for Laurent to make a note. "Maybe what you need is a second opinion."

"Maybe," replies Laurent absently, still scanning over his notes. "Wait, shut up for a minute, let me look through this."

Damen drags his chair closer, trying to read the page over Laurent's shoulder, when Laurent grabs another stack of paper and almost smashes them into Damen's face.

"Make yourself useful, if you are so eager to help," he mutters, eyes flicking down the page.

Damen grabs it, settling back onto the chair. He grabs a pen from the desk, and for a moment is struck with a sense of déjà vu.

It knocks him off his feet and snatches the breath from his lungs; Damen pauses, staring at Laurent, studious with his glasses slipping down the bridge of his nose, and feels a strange, sweltering fondness in his chest.

 _Don't be silly,_ he chides himself, _déjà vus are scientifically proven to be your mind playing tricks._

 _But is it really,_ says his heart.

 _Is it really,_ says his head.

For the next two minutes, Damen tries to refocus on the papers. He succeeds, albeit with much difficulty.

* * *

The rain stops in the early morning of a midsummer’s day.

Laurent heads out to town, and Damen spends the day in the garden, smiling up at his love's window every few hours so that his love won't feel neglected.

The apricots are fruiting. Damen doesn't know what to think, except that it must be Laurent's presence. When they are ripe, he thinks he will present the first fruit to Laurent, the second to his love, and the third to himself; eaten freshly plucked, sweet and refreshing on a hot summer's day.

When Laurent returns, there is a lightness to him that Damen doesn't know he misses until he sees it again. The sunlight makes his hair shine like a nymph of the stars, makes his skin glow like Beatrice descending from the heavens, and together with his light steps, Laurent looks like he is _floating:_ a lively fairy dancing in the meadows, savage yet beautiful - nature untouched, the brightness of a young sun whose rays are radiant instead of scorching.

"Hello," says Laurent (breathless, vibrant, Apollonian, _alive_ ) - when he comes up beside Damen.

"Hello," says Damen, and gestures at the apricots. "Any day now."

"Guess it's not ornamental after all," Laurent says, and he smiles - full-blown and gorgeous and Damen is starstruck, is being blinded by the force of the smile, relaxed and unbidden, and _there are dimples, oh god,_ and he thinks, _oh,_ oh, _I’ve been stupid in love with you._

"It's been waiting all along," says Damen.

* * *

_Another fragment of the past: Nikandros saying, you can't fall a little in love, Damen, you can't do things in half. You love or you don't, you love him or you love her. It's when your heart is split that you hurt._

_Damen thinks of mothers. He thinks of lovers found and lovers lost, and he says, I know._

_And then, helplessly, he says, but I can't help but love._

* * *

Damen climbs to the rooftop, even though the stars are clearer from the lighthouse.

It may be a few minutes and it may be an hour, it may be a moment and it may be an eternity, but eventually, Laurent joins him.

"Tell me a story," says Damen as way of greeting.

"I don't know," says Laurent, "what kind of story do you want to hear?"

"Tell me a fairytale," answers Damen.

Laurent lies back, watching the stars for a long while. "I’m not good at coming up with stories.”

“But you read so much,” Damen insists. “Tell me a story you’ve read then.”

Laurent thinks about it. “I don’t know.”

“Don’t be shy,” Damen prods gently. “Just a short one?”

He catches Laurent’s eyes, then. Laurent is wide-eyed, pupils dilated, eyes shining and transparent even though he is anything _but._ His eyelashes are long and thick and curls, like a supermodel’s. There is a flyaway strand that dangles by his jaw. Damen doesn’t reach out to tuck it behind the ear.

“Ok,” says Laurent, “ok.” He averts his gaze. He begins, “Once upon a time."

* * *

_Once upon a time, there was a beautiful canary in a gilded cage, and it thought it was happy, because it didn't need to think and it didn't need to hunt - it only needed to sing, and everyone would love it._

_However, one day, the master of the house bought a parrot. Everyone's attention was directed at the parrot, and the canary was forgotten in its cage. It was slowly starving, slowly dying, and no one noticed._

_A stray cat saw the scene and leaped onto the window sill. 'Dear Canary,' it said, 'I have been hunting for days and I am hungry. Won't you let me feast on you, for you are expiring anyway and it isn't good to waste food.'_

_'Sir Cat,' said the Canary, 'for you to eat me, you would need to open the cage.'_

_'That can be easily done,' said the Cat, 'but if I do so without your word, then you would fly away, and I would be left hungry.'_

_'But then I would live!' cried the Canary. 'Why would I let you eat me then?'_

_'That is false,' said the Cat, 'you have lived in a cage all your life, what do you know of surviving in the outside world? You wouldn't know how to hunt, you wouldn't know how to avoid predators, you wouldn't know how to live. You would die.'_

_'Then let's make a bet,' said the Canary, 'you let me free, and I would survive, and a year from now, we would meet again, and you would see me alive and well.'_

("It's going to die," Damen comments.

Laurent shushes him.)

_The Cat agreed and set the Canary free. The Canary flew higher and higher into the sky, begging for the wind to carry it further, the cloud to cushion its eventual fall, the sun to give it direction. It flew and flew until day turned into night and the moon hung in the sky._

_'Dear Canary,' said the Moon, who did not see what happened in the day, 'what are you doing?'_

_'Exploring,' said the Canary. 'I never knew I could fly so far yet not reach an end.'_

_The Moon, slowly understanding the situation, suggested, 'Would you like to fly forever?'_

_'Oh I would love to!' the Canary exclaimed. 'Think of the sights I would see! Think of freedom I would feel! Yes, I would like to fly forever in these endless skies.'_

_So the Moon granted its wish and placed the Canary in the skies as a constellation. A year later, the Cat returned to their agreed spot, and glancing up at the sky, saw the Canary soaring above its head. 'Why!' said the Cat, 'it really did it!'_

_And so the Canary lived happily ever after. The end._

* * *

"That is a cute story," says Damen, "except that in the end, it did die."

"It lived on as a bunch of stars."

"Stars burn out too," Damen reminds. "And it must be cold and lonely up there. I don't see how it can live happily ever after."

"If you are so unsatisfied," Laurent argues, eyes twinkling with challenge, "why not you tell another story?"

"Why not," Damen agrees. He clears his throat.

* * *

_Once upon a time, there lived two girls, Lily White and Poppy Red, who are very good friends. They grew up on the same street, in the same school, and eventually worked in the same city. There, they both met and fell in love, and they both bore sons._

_But their lives are not the same: Lily White was married to a delightful viscount who loved her like the ocean loved the shore, and she bore two sweet brothers who loved her very much. Poppy Red, however, married a king who chased after the sun. Poppy Red was left with a kingdom to run and aristocrats to control, and the stress was so crushing that she had been unable to bear her husband a son._

_Lily White, seeing her predicament, decided to help her dearest friend. 'I know of a rose that grew at the edge of the universe that could grant a child even to the most infertile wombs,' she assured, and set off on her adventures after bidding her husband and sons farewell._

_She first crossed the ocean, and the fish gathered around her. 'Lily White oh Lily White,' they cried, 'why torture yourself so? Why set off on this precarious journey instead of enjoying your well-earned domestic bliss?'_

_'Dear fish,' Lily White cried, 'because Poppy Red is my dearest friend, and if she is unhappy, then so am I.'"_

(Laurent is a good listener, but it seems even he can't bear to interrupt, "Only _dearest_ friend?”

"Shush," says Damen, "this is a fairytale.”)

_So Lily White continued her journey and crossed the mountains. The Sun in the skies cried to her. 'Oh, Lily White,' it said, 'I who sees everything, saw that Poppy Red's husband, the dearest king, was consorting with her lady-in-waiting! For a man as disloyal as that, was it worth the trouble to help Poppy Red fulfil her duty to him?'_

_'He may be disloyal,' said Lily White, 'but he loved Poppy Red in his own way, and I trust that a wise King like him - personal flaws aside - would take good care of his child. So let me be!'_

_Lily White continued on her journey and reached the ends of the world. The rose grew on the trunk of an old pine tree, and the pine tree was reluctant to let Lily White pluck the rose._

_'I nurtured the rose since it was a seedling,' said the pine, 'and loved it like it was my own child. Why should I let you take it for your friend?'_

_'Because if you would not let it fulfil its purpose,' said Lily White, 'then it would no longer be special. It would simply be a normal rose, gone to waste because of your selfishness.'_

_The pine thought Lily White wise and let her pluck the rose. Lily White took the rose back to her kingdom and brewed a tea with the rose for her dear friend Poppy Red. Poppy Red drank the tea and bore a son, whom she loved to the moon and back, whom Lily White loved to the far reaches of the galaxies, whom her husband and her sons adored to the edge of the universe. The good news reached even the distant ends of the kingdom, and the King returned in delight, determined to do right by his son. Together, Lily White and Poppy Red organised play dates and tea parties, and Lily White's family became trusted advisors to the royal family and everyone lived happily ever after._

* * *

"It seemed like the start of a polygamous relationship," Laurent comments dryly. Damen throws his head back and laughs.

"It does, doesn't it?" he agrees. "Now it's your turn:

"Tell me a story about why you can't go back," says Damen, "make it a fairytale again. Give it a happy ending."

"That's hard: it's not a happy story."

"Try," Damen urges.

Laurent toes one of the tiles. He begins slowly:

* * *

_There were three princes - the heir of the Kingdoms of Spring, Summer, and Autumn - who were very good friends, until one day, a war broke out and they have to each serve their duties. While Spring and Autumn formed an alliance, Summer was strong enough to take on the world alone. And so it goes, until the three princes grew up and they went to study from the wise wizard from the neutral Lands of Winter._

_They didn't recognise each other at first - no, until the prince of Autumn recognised the emblem on the prince of Summer's amulet._

_'I don't like him,' says the prince of Spring, 'he is our enemy.'_

_'Nonsense,' says the prince of Autumn, 'we are on neutral grounds, and haven't you heard? Strategic alliances can greatly boost market power. Don't you think it's time for a ceasefire?'_

("The prince of Autumn seems like a smart man," Damen comments approvingly.)

_Eventually, the princes grew close and the prince of Summer and the prince of Spring fell in love, but the price of duty proved too heavy, and no one did anything until one day, the king of Summer died in battle._

_'I would have to leave,' said the prince of Summer, 'would you remember me fondly?'_

_'I will,' the prince of Spring promised, and with those as the parting words, the prince of Summer left._

("A prince fell in love with another prince?" Damen teases. "Who just happened to be the heir of the rival kingdom? How cute."

This time, Laurent kicks his shin.

"Let me finish," he says.)

_Fast forward a few years, and the kingdom of Spring is embroiled in its own civil war. The king has passed away, but the prince of Spring is not yet of age, leaving the hereditary battle caught between the Grand Duke and the prince of Autumn, who married a princess of Spring._

_The prince of Spring sought the prince of Summer for help, who is now king of Summer and perhaps it's sentimentality, or perhaps its love, because the king of Summer readily accepted. With his help, the prince of Spring deposed the Grand Duke and ushered in a new era of joint monarchical rule between the kingdoms of Autumn and Spring._

_The prince of Spring was delighted, but unbeknownst to him, the king of Summer struck a deal with an old witch that gave the prince of Spring the opportunities to win. In exchange, the king of Summer was cursed such that were the prince of Spring to stop loving him, he would transform into a phoenix._

("That seemed irresponsible of him," says Damen, "he's King - he should put his kingdom before love."

"Yes," Laurent agreed, "but they were so in love, so the king of Summer was confident that the prince of Spring would love him back."

"Let me guess - he didn't?"

"He did," Laurent answers, quietly, "he did, but he didn't know he did.”)

_Running a country is no easy business, even if the prince of Spring is still only a prince and not the queen like his sister. The prince of Spring was so distracted trying to deal with power consolidations and potential rebellions that eventually, his love for the king of Summer trickled away day-by-day until he forgot to love him._

_Disappointed, the king of Summer transformed into a phoenix and flew to the top of an impenetrable mountain, where he lived till the end of days._

* * *

"And that's it?" Damen asks. "That's not why you're here."

"No," Laurent answers, "I am here because someone wants me dead. That's a completely unrelated story. Maybe the prince of Spring accidentally offended a troll, and the troll tried to get his buddies to kill the prince, so the prince of Autumn hid the prince of Spring in a cave that is guarded by a dragon and his warrior-princess, while everyone tries to figure out how to destroy the troll in the meantime."

Damen beams. "I am a dragon? I'm pleased." The smile falters. "Then why do you tell me the story between the princes? If it's a separate story."

"It's more interesting," says Laurent. "Everyone prefers a romance between two naïve princes than the adventures of an arrogant one."

* * *

As there is a rise and fall, and as there is an ebb and flow, there is escalation and there is détente, and the sun rises and sets.

Damen knows this as a fact. He knows a lot of things, these days.

He knows that once upon a time, there are two men who loved each other, and therefore they were happy.

He knows that once upon a time, there are two men who loved each other, but it’s not enough. It never is; the rules of the world and of society dictates a catch, a push and pull, a consequence, and that there are always more important things to fulfil. Family, for one, is a heavy burden. Social duty is another. When one stands in full view of the world, there is a price to pay for the privilege, and those that forgot will have a debt to pay. Society from all ranks and all crevices demand repayment in blood.

And maybe Damen is the one at fault: he trusts too much, sees too little, lets the details wash over him instead of remembering to be _en garde_ , content with the status quo when what he should really do is brace himself for change. Maybe Damen is guilty because he loves too much and prepares too little, forgetting that the past is stagnant the present is tumultuous and the future is fluid. Maybe Damen is wrong because he takes ten steps to meet a man who can only take one – too eager to focus on the rest of the world – and is disappointed when he has to backtrack.

Damen loves like the crush of the waves and the currents of the seas: ebb and flow, rise and fall, suffocating and freeing. He loves so fervently and he gives so thoroughly that he finds himself staring at fragile wrists and the smooth curve of a neck joining the lines of the shoulder to a face slanted towards the sun the side, his love thrown back into his face by a twist of fate even if his efforts scream magnitudes, and it all trickles into nothing, into him asking _and is that it? Is that all there is?_ as he searches his love’s face, Laurent’s face, beseeching and imploring.

It amounts to him in the rain, him with wetness trickling down the side of his face, him with a red poppy tucked behind his left ear, a red poppy flushed and blooming at his temple, thinking _ah, I forgot to water the plant,_ and _ah, I will miss tomorrow’s dinner,_ and _will he cry, I wonder?_

 _Oh no,_ he thinks, _will he think that I bailed?_

A train about to derail being directed on track by a diligent vigilante, only for the track to blow up; how fitting, is it not, for the modern romance of a century that puts Victorian sensationalists and Old Wild West classics to shame?

Damen loves.

* * *

Damen hasn't realised that Laurent is watching until he closes his love's door behind him and finds himself staring right at Laurent.

"Who are you talking to?" Laurent asks, uncharacteristically nervous.

"My love," Damen answers, "they are very ill, so I have to speak softly."

"Damen," Laurent cries, a little alarmed, a little frightened, "there's _nothing_ in the room. Your lover - whoever you are seeing - they don't exist. There's nothing, Damen. Nothing."

Damen slowly pries off Laurent's grip on his shirt. He holds Laurent's hands in his palms; cups them and hopes it comes off as assuring rather than indulgent.

"You can't see them yet," he promises, "but you will, soon. It takes some time for your eyes to adjust."

"You mean when I grow mad."

"I mean," Damen repeats, "when your eyes adjust.

"Often," Damen continues, "it's easier to see their reflection in a mirror than to look at them outright - because they shine so bright, you see. They are like stars, visible only from the corner of the eyes. But it's not fair to compare them to stars because stars don't shine as bright as the morning sun."

Laurent steps back, shaken. Damen has never seen Laurent shaken. He's almost disappointed. "You're mad."

"Perhaps I am," says Damen, "but I don't think I'm mad, Laurent. I don't think madness looks like this."

"Then what is it supposed to look like?" Laurent demands, a little hysterical. "What is your love supposed to look like?"

 _My love has skin like wax paper and hair like the morning sunshine,_ Damen thinks, _my love has fingers that flutter like butterflies, like hummingbirds, if these creatures are pale and tender. And my love has eyes like the stars, a smile that trickles across their face, their body Asawa's installations. My love is a genius and an innocent and brilliant and tender, and I love them even after death does us apart._

"They're beautiful," he says. He really means they _were_ beautiful - and they still are, now, but it's more of a shadow of its former beauty: beauty in the form of fragility, of delicacy, of exquisiteness.

(But that's what eternity does to you. Eternity preserves the soul in a moment, eternity preserves even as time crumbles everything else. Laurent doesn't understand, he's still dreaming of life and these few weeks are a respite, not eternity; but Damen has an eternity to learn, and an eternity more to go, so he sees beauty in the fleeting and teaches himself to wait.)

Laurent searches Damen's face, and whatever it is he finds, it leaves his breath short and his fingers trembling as he rests them against the bannister.

* * *

Auguste arrives at the mansion during the last shades of summer as the last light fades, the sky a tint of red resisting the deep blue sinking heavily onto it. Auguste huddles deeper into his cloak as he stares up towards his love's window.

Damen stares back. Then, tiredly, he pushes himself up and heads down to open the door.

Laurent beats him to it.

"You're here," Laurent says, and he's beaming so brightly he's out of place in this old white house.

"Laurent," says Auguste, "it's time to go home."

"Back to reality," Damen adds. Laurent startles. The reaction is no surprise: they haven't spoken since Laurent saw Damen's love. "Will you take a poppy from the vase before you go?"

"I don't -"

"Will you pluck an apricot from the tree before you go?" Damen continues. "Its fruits are finally ripe. It bore fruits for you."

"Laurent," Auguste warns.

Laurent visibly swallows. "I'll take it with me," he says.

Damen smiles. "That's good," he says. "The tree will be pleased to fulfil its purpose."

Laurent takes a step out of the door.

"Remember, Laurent," Damen calls, not bothering to stop him. "An eternity is but a moment, and a moment is as ephemeral as love."

(And Laurent wakes: white sheets on him, white sheets under him, Auguste alert yet bleary-eyed like he has not slept for weeks as he smiles at Laurent, the feeling of age in his joints that reminds him of too many days hunched over his laptop as he rushes out his final year thesis while his _love_ peers over his shoulders, the dull pain in his stomach, the hum of machines.

The face missing in his patchwork memories is filled, and Laurent remembers.)

* * *

Chimes the sound of machine beeps, and he weeps.

* * *

 

  

 

_It was now the hour that melts a sailor's heart_

_and saddens him with longing on the day_

_he's said farewell to his belovèd friends,_

_and when a traveler, starting out,_

_is pierced with love if far away he hears_

_a bell that seems to mourn the dying light_

_\-- Canto VIII, Purgatorio, The Divine Comedy, Dante (tr. Hollander)_

 

 

**Author's Note:**

> tl;dr, the summary/spoiler is that Laurent was shot and took a trip down to purgatory, where he found his dead lover Damen before he woke up.
> 
> For notes on the _symbolism_ (ew) and other notes that way surpassed the ao3 character limits, please head to the [tumblr link](https://orsfri.tumblr.com/post/175235684966/a-bell-that-seems-to-mourn-the-dying-light) under the readmore here.


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